NOTE: Even
though this is a comic book, Maus is the true story of Art Spiegelman
and his father, Vladek, who survived the concentration camps during the
Holocaust. He spent years interviewing his father, and then turned those
interviews into two comics, Maus I and Maus II (though we have
them in one collection). He also made the fascinating decision to use animals
to tell his story: the Jews are mice, the Germans are cats, the Polish are
pigs, the French are frogs, etc. You have plenty of time to read this for next
week, so take your time and think about how the story uses pictures and words
to tell a “true” story. The questions below will help you make sense of the
story if you’ve never read a comic before and are confused by the format.
Answer two of
the following for Monday’s class:
Q1: The obvious question first: why do you think Spiegelman uses mice, cats, etc., in his story? Does this take away from the seriousness of his story? Does it make it seem less real? Or does it help us focus on a more important part of the story? Use an example from the comic that helps illustrate this.
Q2: What kind of relationship do Artie and his father have in the comic? Where do we see this specifically? Why do you think he focuses on this rather than simply telling the story of the Holocaust outright?
Q3: At the end of Chapter One, Vladek tells Artie not to include certain parts of his story, including his relationship with Lucia, because “this isn’t so proper, so respectful.” Since he often wants to edit out the truth or make himself look better, do we trust him as a narrator? Do you think we’re getting the absolute truth, or merely his version of it?
Q4: There have been many stories about the Holocaust—books, movies, TV shows, etc. All of them are trying to remind us what life was like for the survivors (and the victims) so we can never deny these crimes. Discuss one thing you learned from the book (a small detail, a historical fact, or something else) that deepened your appreciation for this moment of history. What dark element of the Holocaust did it help shine a light on for you.
Q1: The obvious question first: why do you think Spiegelman uses mice, cats, etc., in his story? Does this take away from the seriousness of his story? Does it make it seem less real? Or does it help us focus on a more important part of the story? Use an example from the comic that helps illustrate this.
Q2: What kind of relationship do Artie and his father have in the comic? Where do we see this specifically? Why do you think he focuses on this rather than simply telling the story of the Holocaust outright?
Q3: At the end of Chapter One, Vladek tells Artie not to include certain parts of his story, including his relationship with Lucia, because “this isn’t so proper, so respectful.” Since he often wants to edit out the truth or make himself look better, do we trust him as a narrator? Do you think we’re getting the absolute truth, or merely his version of it?
Q4: There have been many stories about the Holocaust—books, movies, TV shows, etc. All of them are trying to remind us what life was like for the survivors (and the victims) so we can never deny these crimes. Discuss one thing you learned from the book (a small detail, a historical fact, or something else) that deepened your appreciation for this moment of history. What dark element of the Holocaust did it help shine a light on for you.
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